'Manila not bankrupt when Lim left'

ABS-CBN News

MANILA – Manila City did not go bankrupt when former Mayor Alfredo Lim ended his term in June 2013, his chief of staff said.

Citing a consolidated daily cash position report prepared by the city treasurer’s office, Ric de Guzman said the total funds left as of July 1, 2013 is P1,557,249,704.19.

The more than P1.5 billion funds left by Lim are broken down as follows:

Cash-in treasury P11,162,298.04

Cash-other banks (current account) P768,318,222.49

Cash-other banks P777,769,183.66

De Guzman said this only proves that the statements issued by incumbent Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada that the city had been left bankrupt and with a P3.5 billion debt are not true.

He said that just like any other city, Manila has an estimated income for the year. This is not realized, however, as the actual collection usually falls short of the estimated income.

In the case of Manila, de Guzman said that while the estimated income was some P9 billion, the actual revenues collected reached about P6 billion.

“Common sense dictates that estimated income is so much different from actual income. So you cannot consider as ‘debt’ the difference between the P9 billion estimated income and the P6 billion income that was actually collected,” he said.